Nguyễn Xuân Clan

Eight generations recorded from An Cựu village, beginning with the founder who settled here in the early nineteenth century. The clan keeps its ancestral hall, its burial ground, and the generation poem by which its children are still named.

• Origins of the family

  What the family book says about where the lineage came from, and the two readings of it that have never been reconciled.

• Settlement at An Cựu

  How the household established itself in the village, and how the second generation came to build the ancestral hall.

• The move south, 1954

  The division of the family that created the southern line, and the handwritten copy of the book that travelled with it.

• Work and trade

  What the family did for a living, and how that changed across eight generations.

• Family rules and customs

  The principles recorded by the second generation, still read aloud at the spring ceremony.